Tag Archives: Dirty Looks

Dirty Looks: Have you ever seen a transsexual before? Videos by Chris E. Vargas

Tuesday, February 26, 2013
9:00 pm
Anthology Film Archives
32 Second Avene (at 2nd Street)
New York, NY 10003
Tickets: $10.00
Tickets

CHRIS E. VARGAS In Attendance!

Dirty Looks returns from their West Coast roadshow, screening the first-ever retrospective program of work by Bay Area artist, Chris E. Vargas!!

Perhaps best known as one half of the web series “Falling in Love … with Chris and Greg,” a sitcom about a queer odd couple — one liberal, one radical; one transgender, one not — Vargas has produced a body of work that is politically subversive, culturally acute and utterly hysterical. From post-apocalyptic LA bikers to “the first pregnant man,” Liberace to Bronski Beat, these works challenge the homonormative, queering pop culture and rewriting GLBTQ histories.

PROGRAM:
Road Rash, Super8 on video, 6min., 2003
Homotopia (with Eric Stanley), digital video, 26min., 2006
Falling in Love… With Chris and Greg: Work of Art! Reality TV Special, digital video, 23min., 2008
Extraordinary Pregnancies, digital video, 10min., 2010
Have You Ever Seen a Transsexual Before?, digital video, 4 min., 2010
Liberaceón, digital video, 16min., 2011
ONE for all…, digital video, 7min., 2012
CRY BOY CRY, digital video, 5min., 2012

Beginning with Vargas’s first Super8 film, this program will explore the artist’s penchant for humorous impersonations and socio-political reinterpretations. Homotopia finds Vargas collaborating with Eric Stanley on a narrative short, in which radical queers crash the hypocritical wedding ceremony of a recent tearoom trick. Extraordinary Pregnancies explores the transphobic discourses parlayed through the media firestorm that surrounded the world’s first pregnant man, Thomas Beatie. In the video from which this program takes its title, Vargas enlightens various American landmarks with his trans body, begging of them the question, “Have You Ever Seen a Transsexual Before?” In both ONE for all... and Liberaceón, the artist portrays historically queer public figures (philanthropist Reed Erickson and mister showmanship, Liberace), rearticulating (rather comically) these icons relationships to queer politics and philosophical standpoints within their respective epochs. And, in the recent episode of “Falling in Love... with Chris and Greg”: Season Two, Chris and Greg compete against fellow artists to create the perfect work of queer failure, inserting themselves in Bravo’s reality TV show, “Work of Art.” Hint, it does not end well.

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Dirty Looks: On Location

Dirty Looks: On Location is a month-long series of queer interventions in New York City spaces. Over the course of July, artist film and video will appear in these queer social spaces and former sites of queer sociality (like shuttered bars, bathhouses and former meeting zones). A new piece, a different setting on each night of July.  Full details at dirtylooksnyc.org.

1 Participant Inc | 253 E. Houston Street | 8-10PM
Unauthorized Interviews, Tara Mateik– A live re-performance of an interview between Jane Pauley, Steve Rubell, Michael Jackson and Liza Minnelli, as embodied by Mateik, K8 Hardy and friends.

2 The Blue | 206 8th Avenue | 4PM – 4AM
Limpia, Juan Betancurth – The perversification of everyday objects.

3 Rockbar | 185 Christopher Street | 8:30PM

Stop the Movie (Cruising), Jim Hubbard + Sodom, Luther Price – Footage of the West Village demonstrations in of William Friedkin’s Cruising becomes a meditation on activism itself. Meanwhile, Price mixes nostalgia and horror, using 70s Super-8 porn, into an elegiac landscape of desire and violence.

4 GYM Sportsbar | 167 8th Avenue | 9PM
Star Spangled Basher, Carl Michael George – 1991: US military intervention in the Middle East, rising homophobic and racist violence, and the apotheosis of Whitney Houston.

5 Printed Matter | 195 Tenth Avenue | 11AM – 8PM, continuous loop.
Nayland & AA, June 20, 2001 (Coat), Nayland Blake and AA Bronson – A three channel video that, on two separate screens, depicts the artists smearing one another’s faces with vanilla and chocolate frosting; a third screen shows both faces and frosting melding together as the two kiss.

6 Cinema Village | 22 East 12th Street | 11:59PM
The Queen, Frank Simon – This legendary film is one of the earliest documentations of a drag ball, judged by Andy Warhol and featuring Flawless Sabrina and Crystal LaBeija. Flawless Sabrina in attendance! Screening in honor of Marsha P. Johnson.

7 QUEERLATES at The Spectrum | 59 Montrose Avenue, Brooklyn | 4PM – 6PM
Fast Twitch / Slow Twitch, Heather Cassils – The artist documents her physical transformation while engaging in a strict bodybuilding regimen in a two-channel video installation.

8 Washington Square Park | Greenwich Village | 9PM
Social Movement, Emily Roysdon – Utilizing several participants, a stage is created, framed, and imaged with repetitive gestures and poses.

9 The W Hotel | 1567 Broadway | 9PM
OAK Presents It’s A Jackie Thing, Charles Atlas – A document of the drag scene at Jackie 60, where impersonators included Martha Graham, Kurt Cobain and Sid Vicious, lip-syncing to Nancy Sinatra.

10 The Out NYC | 510 West 42nd Street | 9PM
A One Man Show, Jean Paul Goude – A performance video of the most contemporary caliber, Grace Jones’ Grammy nominated video tape is unparalleled in its aesthetic integrity, post-modern performativity and ferocity. RSVP required.

11 Barracuda | 275 W. 22nd Street | 6PM – 12AM, continuous loop.
The Galactic Pot Healer, Shana Moulton– After breaking her favorite ceramic pot, a woman receives several messages from her medicine cabinet guiding her to the Galactic Pot Healer. (6PM – 12AM)

12Abrons Art Center at the Henry Street Settlement | 466 Grand Street | 8:00PM
(are we and/or do we) LIKE MEN, Pier Marton, in collaboration with Wendy Ultan and Glenn Biegon – Based on his experiences at the National Conference on Men and Masculinity, Marton interviews men on gender conditioning.

13 Abrons Art Center at the Henry Street Settlement | 466 Grand Street | 8:30PM
Cobra Woman, Robert Siodmak with Jungle Island, Jack Smith – The ravishing Queen of Technicolor, Maria Montez shines in a double role for this camp tale of island peril, paired with Jack Smith’s closest approximation of the Montez aesthetic, starring Mario Montez.

14 Metropolitan | 559 Lorimer Street, Brooklyn

11PM – 4AM
We are Gag!, The Gay and Lesbian Community with Gag! – A new commission in nightlife social practice that examines the role of cinema on the construction of queer identity and learned social behavior through video projections of its patrons, dancing, debauchery, and mirrored masks.

15 Uncle Charlie’s Downtown (former site)

56 Greenwich Avenue | 2PM – 6PM, continuous loop.
Joan Does Dynasty, Joan Braderman – An interactive critical analysis of one of television’s most iconic and controversial primetime series.

16 The Phoenix | 447 E. 13th Street | 7PM
Jerovi, José Rodríguez-Soltero – A young man makes love, first to a rose and then to himself, in a lush, stylized landscape, in this dreamlike celebration of narcissistic desire. Also featuring readings of post-humously published poetry by porn actor Roy Garrett, in collaboration with Spunk arts magazine.

17 The Westway | 75 Clarkson Street | 8:30PM
Gayletter Presents SweetBerry Sonnet (Remixed), Kalup Linzy – Linzy remixes his video compilation SweetBerry Sonnet, woven together as music videos performed by a recurring cast of characters, including Taiwan and Labisha, and created in conjunction with his full-length album from 2008 of the same name.

18 The Cock | 29 2nd Avenue | 10PM – 4AM
Cock Gobblin’, Peter Cramer and Jack Waters – A mash-up of décor installation & film made especially for the cock that encapsulates darkroom debauch, presenting sexy old and sexy new.

19 Andrew Edlin Gallery | 134 Tenth Ave | 6 – 8PM
The Salad Days of Art Video Disco, Various Stars – There comes a moment in every person’s life when they realize that what they made that one time was pretty good. But maybe weird.

20 Peter Rabbit’s (former site) | 10th Street and West Side Highway | 2PM – 6PM, continuous loop.
Anthem, Marlon Riggs – One of Marlon Riggs’s final works—a deeply personal work using the visual language of music videos as a political platform.

21 The Kitchen | 512 West 19th Street | 7PM
NYC PREMIERE! This Is Not A Dream, Gavin Butt & Ben Walters – A new documentary, highlighting artists use of video as a platform for broadcast and world creation. Featuring Dickie Beau, Dara Birnbaum, Nao Bustamante, Vaginal Davis, and the Divine David.

22 Nowhere | 322 E. 14th Street | 4PM – 4AM, continuous loop
Splatter Movie, Mike Kuchar – “Sex, sleaze, drugs, blood, and much, much more!”

23 Julius’ | 159 West 10th Street | 4PM – 4AM, continuous loop
Tearoom, William E. Jones – Surveillance footage shot by police over the course of a 1962 crackdown on public gay sex in Mansfield, Ohio.

24XL Cabaret and Lounge + The Out NYC | 510 West 22nd Street | 8PM / 9:30PM
The Color of Love, Peggy Ahwesh +Colt, Deanna Erdmann – Working from 80s gay male pornography, Erdmann intercuts a pulsating procession of sexual scenarios and cultural signifiers in this looped installation work, while Ahwesh adds her own marks and manipulations to found and decayed amateur 8mm porn footage featuring two women and a curiously unresponsive man.

25 Judson Memorial Church | 55 Washington Square South | 8:30PM
Blue, Derek Jarman – This monochrome blue projection chronicles Jarman’s AIDS infection with voiceover assistance from Tilda Swinton, Nigel Terry, and other collaborators.

26 Maysles Cinema | 343 Malcolm X Boulevard / Lenox Avenue | 7:30PM
Portrait of Jason, Shirley Clarke – Sexuality, race and class collide in Clarke’s fascinating and problematic film portrait of sometime gay hustler Jason Hallyday.

27 Adonis Theatre | 8th Avenue and 43rd Street | 10:45AM – 12AM
Loads, Curt McDowell – Pull up a chair at one of our most site-specific events. So specific, that you must RSVP in advance at dirtylooksnyc@gmail.com.

28Flamingo Club (former site) | 219 East 2nd Ave. | 2 – 6PM, continuous loop
She Don’t Fade, Cheryl Dunye – A candid portrait of black lesbianism by “New Queer Wave” filmmaker, Cheryl Dunye.

29 Le Petit Versailles | 346 East Houston Street | 7:30PM
Hail the New Puritan, Charles Atlas – This exhilarating and unclassifiable portrait of dancer Michael Clark is an immersion in the music, art and fashion of the 80s London queer underground.

30Eastern Bloc | 505 East 6th Street #1 | 10PM – 4AM
Various Titles, Fred Halsted – Halsted’s films are the only hardcore titles in the permanent collection at MoMA. Features include LA Plays Itself, A Night At Halsted’s and films in which Halsted appeared as an actor.

31 Heather’s | 506 East 13th Street | 10PM – 2AM
YOUTUBE XXXtrava-GANZA, Teams – Remember back in the day when Queer Eye was a “thing” – and the fact that it was a hit was a gigantic surprise? Now everyone loves RuPaul. How has that media breakthrough of gay cultural presence trickled down to YouTube.

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Dirty Looks: Charles Atlas

Wednesday, January 25
8:30 pm
Judson Memorial Church
55 Washington Square South
New York, NY, 10012
$7 Suggested Donation
RSVP here

Program:
Son of Sam and Delilah, video, 27min., 1991
Butcher’s Vogue, video, 5min., 1990
Staten Island Sex Cult, video, 10 min. (excerpt), 1999
Instant Fame! Donald, video, 5min., 2005
Mrs. Peanut Visits New York, video, 6min., 1992-1999
The Draglinquents, video, 7min., 1990
I Fell In Love With A Dead Boy (from Turning), video, 4min., 2012

Dirty Looks, a monthly platform for queer experimental film and video, presents an evening of video work by Charles Atlas. With a career that spans 30-years, Atlas is one of the world’s most stalwart and vibrant videogrpahers of queer cultures and contemporary dance. This program will host a public premiere of material from Turning, a feature-length collaboration between Atlas and Antony Hegarty, on the eve of the Museum of Modern Art commissioned Antony and the Johnsons’ Swanlights performance at Radio City Music Hall. Turning will receive its full premiere in early 2012. Atlas will also be featured in the upcoming 2012 Whitney Biennial. With special performances from Leigh Bowery, Antony, and Carlos Morales (via Atlas’ rarely screened porn film, Staten Island Sex Cult), the works in this program cover more than twenty years of portraiture and collaboration at the vanguard of queer artistic practice.

“New York City 1988. Raging homophobia. A killer on the loose. Disco dancing till dawn. Performers struggle to survive. Delilah seduces Samson in song. Gender illusionists go shopping. Samson and Delilah, 1991.”

The last Wednesday of the month…

Dirty Looks, a monthly platform for queer experimental film and video
http://dirtylooksnyc.org

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Wednesday, July 27 8:30 p.m. Silvershed, 119 West 25th Street PH New York, NY 10001 These distinct, experimental works take stars and other filmmakers as their starting point; working with found footage or reportage style camera work, these seven filmmakers … Continue reading

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